"Nice haul today. Thanks, Old Bill."
The old man named Old Bill smiled as he accepted the recyclables from her adoptive father with his left hand.
Then his gaze shifted, and he immediately spotted Gavo hiding behind the cart.
"So this is the little one you adopted? Come here and let Old Bill take a look at you."
Old Bill waved his left hand warmly, beckoning Gavo over.
Seeing her adoptive father give a slight nod, Gavo poked half her little head out from behind the cart while wearing the gas mask, then slowly walked over to Old Bill.
Old Bill grinned and reached out with his left hand to pat Gavo on the head.
Perhaps because of malnutrition, or perhaps because of illness, his shriveled gums only had two or three lonely teeth left standing guard.
"Your name was, in a sense, given by me. After all, the few words your adoptive father knows how to write were all taught by me. Hahaha."
"Oh, right. Here, have some candy."
Gavo watched as he reached into the inner pocket of his clothes and took out a clean handkerchief. Then, with practiced ease, he untied the live knot with one hand and spread it open on his palm.
Inside the handkerchief were three yellowish sugar blocks of different sizes, giving off an unpleasant industrial synthetic smell.
At the sight of saccharine, a high-energy food, Gavo's growing body instinctively began secreting saliva.
Without refusing Old Bill's kindness, she grabbed all three sugar blocks at once and stuffed them into her mouth beneath the gas mask.
Although the stuff had a strange kerosene-like taste, to Gavo, who had spent a year living in the underhive, it was practically a delicacy.
While savoring the sweetness of the saccharine, Gavo noticed a line of delicate embroidery on Old Bill's handkerchief:
"Sally to Bill"
She could not help but look up at him.
This heavily disabled old man seemed to have a story of his own.
Watching Gavo eat with great enthusiasm, Old Bill chuckled and said,
"You like it, huh? Then how about this. From now on, as long as you come listen to Old Bill tell stories, Old Bill will give you a piece of candy."
After saying that, a trace of anticipation flashed through Old Bill's eyes.
As a cripple, he had endured loneliness throughout all his years in the underhive.
Almost no one cared about him.
Except for the "carnivores" waiting to divide up his old bones after he died.
So when he learned that Gavo's adoptive father had taken her in, Old Bill was filled with envy.
And now, seeing the cute little one's figure in person, his longing for companionship grew even stronger.
Looking at Old Bill, who had taken the initiative to make this offer, Gavo was dumbfounded.
There was actually something this good?
Not only would it help her complete her objective, but it came with food too?
Originally, she had wanted to say that she did not need the saccharine at all, but her disappointing salivary glands and her stomach, which was already starting to churn with hunger, made her nod her little head in silence instead.
Seeing Gavo agree, the joy in Old Bill's eyes practically turned into visible light.
He hurriedly propped up his broken body with his left hand, as if worried that Gavo might change her mind, and began telling the story of a lower-hive worker's son:
Like countless souls trapped inside the metallic tomb known as the hive city, Chesil had been destined from the moment of his birth to become nourishment for the growth of the steel forest.
He was born into a worker's family in the lower hive. Once he became an adult, he naturally inherited the work of his father, who had died of silicosis, and became one of the worker drones laboring within the pipes of the lower hive.
But unlike his father, he possessed what could only be called a gift, a blessing granted by the God-Emperor.
In just ten years, he became the foreman of the local district and gained a reputation of his own.
And that reputation became the turning point of his life, allowing him to be recruited during replenishment by the fleet of a noble Rogue Trader.
From then on, the worker drone of the lower hive followed a voidship into the stars and gained the right to sail across the galaxy...
[Stories heard +1]
[788 stories remaining until objective completion.]
"And then?"
Gavo was completely engrossed, only to realize that Old Bill was no longer speaking.
A trace of slyness appeared in Old Bill's eyes as he smiled and replied,
"Ahem, it's getting a little late today. If you want to hear the rest, come earlier tomorrow."
Gavo was completely stunned by that move.
How could he cut it off there?
Was this guy some failed serial author who had traveled over from M3?
But when Gavo looked at the dim sky, it really was time to head home.
The underhive at night was just about as dangerous as the areas near the outskirts beyond the hive city's range.
And so, carrying a strong desire to hear the continuation of Old Bill's story, Gavo reluctantly followed her adoptive father onto the road home.
On the way back, Gavo suddenly grew curious.
Why did her adoptive father give recyclables to Old Bill?
After she honestly voiced the question in her heart, her adoptive father slowly answered in sign language, using the light from the garbage shacks of other scavengers around them.
"Kindness is the greatest virtue, and virtue is humanity's most precious wealth."
"Do not abandon virtue because you are weak, and do not ignore virtue because you are strong."
"As children of the God-Emperor, we should love our brothers and sisters equally, just as the God-Emperor loves us equally."
After finishing those signs, he patted Gavo on the head and continued,
"Old Bill is a pitiful man, and a lonely man. I am very glad that you agreed to keep him company, my child. The God-Emperor will be proud of you."
Gavo stared blankly at her adoptive father.
Those words sounded like something that should have come from a High Lord who loved the people, a noble Inquisitor, or a proud Rogue Trader.
Not from the mouth of an underhive scavenger whose daily survival depended almost entirely on luck.
She looked at her adoptive father's ugly appearance, at his thin limbs and swollen skin.
At this moment, she truly saw the noble soul buried beneath his crippled body. It was fervent and devout, kind and resilient.
She had once complained about the misery of her reincarnation, thinking that being born in the underhive was her greatest misfortune.
But now she understood that having this adoptive father might be the greatest fortune she had ever received.
...
After meeting Old Bill, Gavo began living a regular life.
In the morning, she followed her adoptive father out and used her talents to hunt for treasure while training her body and grinding her stats along the way.
In the evening, she returned to deliver supplies to Old Bill and listened to him tell stories while she was there.
At night, she went home and slept with the deep, simple sleep of a child.
Old Bill, or rather, Chesil Bill, had once been a well-traveled voidship crewman.
During the suppression of a mutiny on the lower decks, he had been falsely accused of being one of the rebels. Three of his limbs were ruined, and in the end, he was abandoned on this hive world called Autanta.
Through his stories, Gavo learned a great deal of important information.
For example, the star sector they were currently in was the Segmentum Obscurus.
As time passed, Gavo only had one story left to hear before completing her objective.
And on that very day, Old Bill smiled faintly and said,
"Today's story is an old legend that has been passed down on Autanta for a very long time..."
(End of Chapter)
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